Jurgen, James Branch Cabell [ebook reader computer .txt] 📗

“But how can that be, Prince?”

“Why should I tell you, Jurgen? Let it suffice that what I will, not only happens, but has already happened, beyond the ancientest memory of man and his mother. How otherwise could I be Koshchei? And so farewell to you, poor Jurgen, to whom nothing in particular has happened now. It is not justice I am giving you, but something infinitely more acceptable to you and all your kind.”

“But, to be sure!” says Jurgen. “I fancy that nobody anywhere cares much for justice. So farewell to you, Prince. And at our parting I ask no more questions of you, for I perceive it is scant comfort a man gets from questioning Koshchei, who made things as they are. But I am wondering what pleasure you get out of it all?”

“Eh, sirs,” says Koshchei, with not the most candid of smiles, “I contemplate the spectacle with appropriate emotions.”

And so speaking, Koshchei quitted Jurgen forever.

“Yet how may I be sure,” thought Jurgen, instantly, “that this black gentleman was really Koshchei? He said he was? Why, yes; and Horvendile to all intents told me that Horvendile was Koshchei. Aha, and what else did Horvendile say!⁠—‘This is one of the romancer’s most venerable devices that is being practised.’ Why, but there was Smoit of Glathion, also, so that this is the third time I have been fobbed off with the explanation I was dreaming! and left with no proof, one way or the other.”

Thus Jurgen, indignantly, and then he laughed. “Why, but, of course! I may have talked face to face with Koshchei, who made all things as they are; and again, I may not have. That is the whole point of it⁠—the cream, as one might say, of the jest⁠—that I cannot ever be sure. Well!”⁠—and Jurgen shrugged here⁠—“well, and what could I be expected to do about it?”

And that is really all the story save for the moment Jurgen paused on his way home. For Koshchei (if it, indeed, was Koshchei) had quitted Jurgen just as they approached Bellegarde: and as the pawnbroker walked on alone in the pleasant April evening one called to him from the terrace. Even in the dusk he knew this was the Countess Dorothy.

“May I speak with you a moment?” says she.

“Very willingly, madame.” And Jurgen ascended from the highway to the terrace.

“I thought it would be near your supper hour. So I was waiting here until you passed. You conceive, it is not quite convenient for me to seek you out at the shop.”

“Why, no, madame. There is a prejudice,” said Jurgen, soberly. And he waited.

He saw that Madame Dorothy was perfectly composed, yet anxious to speed the affair. “You must know,” said she, “that my husband’s birthday approaches, and I wish to surprise him with a gift. It is therefore necessary that I raise some money without troubling him. How much⁠—abominable usurer!⁠—could you advance me upon this necklace?”

Jurgen turned it in his hand. It was a handsome piece of jewelry, familiar to him as formerly the property of Heitman Michael’s mother. Jurgen named a sum.

“But that,” the Countess says, “is not a fraction of its worth!”

“Times are very hard, madame. Of course, if you cared to sell outright I could deal more generously.”

“Old monster, I could not do that. It would not be convenient.” She hesitated here. “It would not be explicable.”

“As to that, madame, I could make you an imitation in paste which nobody could distinguish from the original, I can amply understand that you desire to veil from your husband any sacrifices that are entailed by your affection.”

“It is my affection for him,” said the Countess quickly.

“I alluded to your affection for him,” said Jurgen⁠—“naturally.”

Then Countess Dorothy named a price for the necklace. “For it is necessary I have that much, and not a penny less.” And Jurgen shook his head dubiously, and vowed that ladies were unconscionable bargainers: but Jurgen agreed to what she asked, because the necklace was worth almost as much again. Then Jurgen suggested that the business could be most conveniently concluded through an emissary.

“If Messire de Nérac, for example, could have matters explained to him, and could manage to visit me tomorrow, I am sure we could carry through this amiable imposture without any annoyance whatever to Heitman Michael,” says Jurgen, smoothly.

“Nérac will come then,” says the Countess. “And you may give him the money, precisely as though it were for him.”

“But certainly, madame. A very estimable young nobleman, that! and it is a pity his debts are so large. I heard that he had lost heavily at dice within the last month; and I grieved, madame.”

“He has promised me when these debts are settled to play no more⁠—But again what am I saying! I mean, Master Inquisitive, that I take considerable interest in the welfare of Messire de Nérac: and so I have sometimes chided him on his wild courses. And that is all I mean.”

“Precisely, madame. And so Messire de Nérac will come to me tomorrow for the money: and there is no more to say.”

Jurgen paused. The moon was risen now. These two sat together upon a bench of carved stone near the balustrade: and before them, upon the other side of the highway, were luminous valleys and treetops. Fleetingly Jurgen recollected the boy and girl who had once sat in this place, and had talked of all the splendid things which Jurgen was to do, and of the happy life that was to be theirs together. Then he regarded the composed and handsome woman beside him, and he considered that the money to pay her latest lover’s debts had been assured with a suitable respect for appearances.

“Come, but this is a gallant lady, who would defy the almanac,” reflected Jurgen. “Even so, thirty-eight is an undeniable and somewhat autumnal figure, and I suspect young Nérac is bleeding his elderly mistress. Well, but at his age nobody has